The firing and arrest last week of University of Michigan head football coach Sherrone Moore were the latest in a string of scandals in the school’s athletics department — so many scandals that it’s now investigating what might be wrong with its culture.

Michigan fired Moore on Wednesday, Dec. 10. That Monday, an unnamed staffer had ended a multiyear affair with the married coach and went to the school with evidence of the relationship. Michigan reportedly had been investigating allegations of the affair — an apparently well-known secret on campus — which the staffer had previously denied.

Hours after his firing, Moore, 39, was arrested and charged with home invasion, stalking and breaking and entering, allegedly for his post-firing behavior at his ex-mistress’s home, where he threatened to kill himself.

On Dec. 11, interim university president Domenico Grasso wrote an open letter to the school about the sorry mess. “This breach of trust by Coach Moore is painful for many in our community, first and foremost, the individuals directly involved in this situation,” he wrote. “Yet our swift and decisive action reflects the university’s staunch commitment to a campus culture of respect, integrity and accountability.” He encouraged anyone with information about the matter to come forward with it.

‘Fire Everybody’

As Alex Kirshner wrote in Slate (headline: “Fire Everybody”), “This athletic department has been the site of a long list of inexcusable coach and staff behaviors in recent years.”

For example, Moore replaced as head football coach Jim Harbaugh, who left in January 2024 to join the pros, but not before the school was embroiled in a sign-stealing scandal. Kirshner points out that several football staffers were arrested for driving under the influence, including Wolverines defensive line coach Greg Scruggs in March 2024, the same month Moore hired him (Scruggs then resigned).

In 2023, Michigan fired offensive coordinator Matt Weiss for allegedly hacking into medical systems to get details about female athletes, including intimate photos. Federal prosecutors indicted him this year. In 2022, Michigan fired its hockey coach, who allegedly told players to lie about COVID-19 tracking and mistreated female staffers.

The list goes on and on.

Practices, Culture

Late last week, The Detroit News, ESPN and other outlets reported that Michigan is conducting a wide-ranging probe into, as ESPN put it, “the practices and culture of its athletic department, centering on how numerous scandals have both occurred and been handled in recent years.”

We don’t know if Michigan is worse than other schools when it comes to wrongdoing — we haven’t crunched the numbers. But in our view, the university is making the right move in conducting a wide investigation to show it’s taking the bad trend seriously. Sure, cynics will say it’s just for show. So what? It’s a smart crisis communications response. It’s time to clean out the Augean stables. Is Michigan up to the Herculean task?

Photo Credit: Michigan Wolverines

Sign up for our free weekly newsletter on crisis communications. Each week we highlight a crisis story in the news or a survey or study with an eye toward the type of best practices and strategies you can put to work each day. Click here to subscribe.